NASA patents self-destructing spacecraft swarms

NASA foresees a future for space flight where interstellar missions are undertaken by teams of smaller, cheaper spacecrafts, instead of one giant shuttle.

A recent patent application shows exactly how the agency plans to deal with failing spaceships that could put its team members at risk, or jeopardise the entire operation: self destruction.

In no uncertain words, the United States Patent Application reveals that “spacecraft in the system can sacrifice themselves for the greater good of the entire [group]”, while the remaining ships exhibit self-adapting behaviour to compensate for the loss.

New Scientist describes some of the proposed self-sacrificing procedures. Highly prescient failures can be solved by the damaged ship setting itself a new course that would either take it away from the swarm before exploding or, as the patent describes, “steering into an asteroid, planet, or sun.”

If that’s not possible, the failing ship can prepare itself to avoid any damaging collisions. Batteries would be discharged and remaining fuel would be vented so that the craft would not shock or explode upon collision. The remaining, working craft would then be able to automatically navigate around the lifeless ship.

The proposed system is biologically-influenced by examples of emergent and self-sacrificing behaviour in nature. One example is the insect world, specifically in swarms of worker bees. Gatherings of bees have shown to freeze themselves to death in the winter, when protecting the queen from harsh temperatures. Plus, bees use their stingers to defend the hive, but will die once they sting.

Other space agencies have designed self-destructing tech, such as Japan’s space centre (JAXA) which revealed plans for ‘suicide satellites’ last year.

The robotic cleaning devices are designed to move space junk from around the International Space Station, by grabbing debris and then rocketing off into the Earth’s atmosphere where the trash, and the satellite, would be destroyed. JAXA estimates the cost of a single kamikaze cleaner to be $4 million.